


Statistics

by ActiveAgression



Series: Soulmate's Thoughts Universe [2]
Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter/Funhaus RPF
Genre: Age Difference, Little bit of angst, M/M, Soulmate-Identifying Marks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-26
Updated: 2015-12-26
Packaged: 2018-05-09 11:18:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,803
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5537885
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ActiveAgression/pseuds/ActiveAgression
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>[Statistics say that everyone gets their soul mark. It may not be right away – but on average: seventy percent get theirs on their eighteenth birthday, twenty-eight percent get theirs before that and the remaining two percent gets theirs after – but everyone gets one. Statistics say so after all: no single person has ever just not had one. </p><p>That doesn't stop Joel from worrying.]</p>
            </blockquote>





	Statistics

**Author's Note:**

> Can i add that i find it hilarious that Ray and Joel are 17 years and 364 days apart in age. Not only did it work well for the story, it's just funny. 
> 
> I wrote this one part and i'm like... shit... that's not going work unless their birthdays are on the same day. I'm such an idiot and then i look it up and Ray's on the 15th of September and Joel's on the 16th and i pretty much cried laughing. 
> 
> Also: this is not the same 'universe' as my last story, it's just the same soul mark concept.

Statistics say that everyone gets their soul mark. It may not be right away – but on average: seventy percent get theirs on their eighteenth birthday, twenty-eight percent get theirs before that and the remaining two percent gets theirs after – but everyone gets one. Statistics say so after all: no single person has ever just not had one. 

That doesn’t stop Joel from worrying. At seventeen, on his eighteenth birthday – clock just about to tick over the exact moment he was born all those years ago – Joel stares intently at his wrist, worried that maybe he will be part of that two percent. He’s met people in that two percent and they never look quite right, like something’s missing from their life and even after their marks come in – all that time they spent soulmate less still effects them, leaving them oddly empty looking, tired husks of the people they could’ve been. 

The clock ticks over and Joel strips frantically, twisting and turning and peering into the mirror. Within minutes he knows, he’s part of that two percent. 

On the same day, as Joel collapses to his bed, naked and defeated and crying – a baby is brought to his mother having been born the day before. He’s weird looking, as all babies are but his mother loves him all the same – thinks he’s beautiful.  
“My little darling Ray,” she coos at him and he frowns back at her and starts crying. 

He doesn’t stop crying until many hours later, at the same point that Joel picks himself up from his bed and decides he’s not going to be one of those lifeless two percenters, he’s going to live his life right, and well.  
Little baby Ray stops crying and the ‘two percent’ that had been twisting tiny and miserable over his tummy since he was born becomes, ‘I choose life.’  
To say his mother is worried is quite the understatement. 

 

When Ray’s ten, he realises his soulmate is awesome. At twenty-eight, Joel tries not to think about his soulmate at all and the blank spaces where the thoughts could’ve been. 

 

When Ray’s sixteen, he realises him soulmate is a guy and his entire view of the world shifts until he’s watching the guys in his class rather then the girls and he wonders why he ever thought girls were so great anyway.  
That same year Ray gets his first kiss and feels cold and terrible inside, like he’s betrayed the soulmate writing accidental poems around his navel.  
He thinks, ‘I’m sorry’ over and over again in the hopes that his soulmate will forgive him for what he’s done but nothing actually gets through. 

He feels wretched and miserable about it all until he’s in bed that night and his stomach gives a familiar twitch. He pulls up his shirt, pushes down the blanket and watches as his heart fractures. There, on his own skin he can see his soulmate enjoying someone else, thinking about someone else’s hips and someone else’s mouth. It’s a lot of writing as well, almost four whole sentences raving about someone else.  
It’s not a record for his soulmate, who seems to think a ridiculous amount at a time and can leave whole essays covering the entire plane of Ray’s stomach but it doesn’t have to be a lot for it to hurt and Ray’s miserable guilt becomes a burning anger because how could someone do that when they know it could end up written all over their soulmate – the one they’re literally meant to be with. 

At sixteen, Ray feels spiteful and kisses that boy he felt so guilty about before – Michael - again and again and hopes that his soulmate sees at least some of it. Despite his anger though, and his spite – he keeps the exploration of Michael and his sexuality casual and they swiftly grow out of it, becoming best friends as Michael waits impatiently for his own soulmate’s thoughts to come in. 

 

On the day before his eighteenth, Ray feels nothing. No worry, no hope. It’s the same as every other day because he already has his words and he doesn’t have to worry like Michael did. He falls asleep and wakes up with no new words and the ones he’s always had are still there so he counts it as a successful birthday and moves on. 

When Joel wakes up the day of Ray’s eighteenth, the day before his own birthday and notices soft words of pillows and orange juice lingering on his palm, he freaks out. He jumps up, races to the bathroom and scrubs furiously at his hand because if this is a prank it may just kill him.  
The words do fade and he chokes down tears until the words rearrange into something else, ‘tease it.’ 

Joel stares, traces his fingers over it and laughs, laughs hysterically until he’s curled up on his bathroom floor crying because at thirty-six he was fairly certain he would be the zero percent; the first person ever to not have a soulmate but the words are there and he stares at them with something like awe, not really keeping track of what’s going on in his mind because he has a soulmate… Holy shit! He has a soulmate!

Briefly after waking up on his eighteenth birthday and deciding life was all just dandy, Ray’s wanking; jerking off languidly and slow because it’s his birthday and he will spoil himself if he wants to. He’ll spend all day masturbating if he wants! It’s his eighteenth after all!  
He’s been edging for a little while, content with the fleeting friction and the warmth building up in his gut, when his stomach lurches a little. He frowns down at it, aware it looks like he’s seriously cross with his dick – he considers sending a picture to Michael briefly – but then words are flowing across his chest. Scared, he watches – he doesn’t know if he can handle another soulmate (or if it’s even possible); the stomach one’s just fine with him and when he looks for the ever-present words – though they may change – they aren’t there and he thinks maybe… maybe they replaced his soulmate with another. He’s never heard of it happen before, but maybe he’s the first… he doesn’t want to be the first. He wants the long hurried sentences of his soulmate. He still has them he realises as the words keep going, flooding his torso until everything is words and he jumps up, pulling his underwear back on to go look in the mirror. 

It's all backwards but he perseveres and starts reading,  
‘… have a soulmate. Soulmate. A soulmate. Soul… soulmate. Finally, soulmate. Thirty-six soulmate and why? Why did? Soulmate. I can’t believe I finally have a soulmate! Happy… years. Find them? Soulmate. Soulmark. Soulmate – words, no. Thoughts. Can’t… Soulmate. Love, soulmate. I love them, love them so much. Pushed – finally soulmate, and I love them. I don’t know them but I love them… Soulmate. Finally. Old? Soulmate! Is he seriously still wanking? Precious. Beautiful soulmate. Like me… Might not like me… love them. Soulmate.’ 

Ray stares at himself in the mirror, at the words spread over his chest – some big like they’ve been shouted and some quivering with excitement. Ray suddenly gets it, like a sledgehammer to the face. He’s had his soulmate’s words, thoughts over his stomach for all his life but his soulmate hasn’t had his.  
His soulmate never knew he kissed Michael, never would’ve considered Ray getting the thoughts when he’d had sex with someone else because he didn’t know Ray could see them.  
He decides there and then that the soulmate system’s a bit crap. 

 

At twenty-three, Ray finds himself making the oddly courageous decision to move to Austin, Texas, to work at the Rooster Teeth office as part of the Achievement Hunters.  
He’s unsure of it all but knows he’s seen Texas many times flickering over his stomach and getting closer to his soulmate just seems like the most right things he’s ever done. 

At forty-one, Joel looks at himself in the mirror and realises he may have failed. He looks exactly like one of those two percent people, tired with dark bags under his eyes and limbs that seem too long for him.  
His hands been stuck on ‘nervous’ all day.

He sighs into the mirror, swipes water over his face and leaves the office bathrooms to walk spectacularly into a smaller man. The tiny guy goes flying, landing on his back with a defeated puff and Joel hurries over to help him up. 

“I am so sorry,” he says as he extends his hand, “really, I’m not normally this – “ 

His voice peters out to nothing as he catches sight of the word held in his palm, ‘hot’ it says and he looks from them to the kid on the floor, back to his hand and back to the bundle on the floor who looks both amused and perplexed, staring up at him. He’s adorable, with pacman on his shirt and stubble and glasses and his hair isn’t a total mop like Joel’s and – and he’s a kid, he’s young.  
He can’t be older then twenty-seven at the most and Joel’s seen himself; he doesn’t look forty but he can’t fool anyone into believing he’s remotely the same age as this guy, but it’s his soulmate. This ridiculously adorable kid is his soulmate so he bends and helps him up and the words tumble out without permission as he says, “how old are you?”

“What?”

“How old are you?” 

“I don’t even know your name man. I’m not telling you that,” Ray stutters, looking more and more like he wants to run off or back away warily. 

“It’s Joel. How old are you?” 

“Why do you want to know?” 

Joel huffs and glares at the stubborn boy, who still gives no indication of answering so he sighs heavily through his nose and fears he’s not making a great first impression but whatever.  
“Cause you think I’m hot,” he declares and Ray steps back actually this time to say,  
“Uh… no… I don’t – uh – think that.” 

“Oh really?” Joel asks, laying on the sarcasm thick as he brings his palm into Ray’s field of view.  
Now they both can see the words, “even hotter when he’s angry,” stuck firmly there.  
Ray’s eyes widen, face flushing with colour. 

“Good thing my spot wasn’t my hand,” he finally says and Joel frowns at him because there’s nothing wrong with his spot. He likes it, it’s convenient and Ray put it there so… he likes it… shut up. 

“Why?” he asks, trying to keep the hurt out of his voice and failing horribly. God, he’s meant to be an actor. 

“No. It’s nothing bad… you just think a lot,” Ray says and pulls up his shirt as if to prove his point. A small novel is written in his skin, letters so small he can’t actually read them and he smiles up at Joel as Joel squints at the naked skin he’d just revealed and pretends he’s actually trying to read them. He knows what it would say anyway. 

“So… how old are you then?” Joel asks, dreading the answer. 

“Twenty-three,” Ray answers, tucking his hands into his pockets and smiling awkwardly up at him. Joel’s own smile drops noticeably because he suspected but now he knows that Ray’s just a kid, eighteen years younger then him. Could he even have physically got his mark at eighteen? Was Ray even alive?

“That’s – that really young…” he chokes out because no way should someone as perfect as Ray have to spend his life with someone eighteen years older. 

“Not that young. It’s like what… a eight year age gap?” Ray asks, shrugging and Joel chuckles.

“Try eighteen.”

Ray gapes at him, “no way.”

“Yes way.”

“You can’t be 41. You’re messing with me,” Ray concludes, smirking like he’s got Joel all figured out. The smirk fades when Joel fishes out his wallet from his pocket and hands over his driver’s license. Ray takes it, squints for a bit then shoves it back at Joel wholeheartedly.  
“Holy hell – you look really really good man. Shit…” He doesn’t look upset exactly, but his words peter off at the end and he keeps looking Joel up and down like he can’t quite get used to the idea. 

“The age gap weirds you out,” Joel concludes, taking his license back and shoving it into his wallet. “It’s fine, we don’t have to be together. It’s not like I’m going to guilt you into this or anything. We can be friends?” He offers and accompanies it with a strained smile because if it were any other situation, he wouldn’t even be thinking of this but he has and is. 

Ray stares at him, glares at him and snorts.  
“We’re not being friends, you idiot,” he declares and Joel feels so small, so unbelievably tiny.  
“We’re soulmates!” Ray tells him, drawing out the word, “we’re going to soulmate the shit out of each other! I mean yolo right?”

“Wha-“ Joel tries to ask but suddenly Ray’s up on his toes, way closer and his lips are pressed firmly to Joel’s – not only muffling the words but entirely suffocating them, killing them in a moment. Joel only panics for a second and a half, staring wide eyed at the dark lashes of Ray’s closed eyes, before he mans up and sinks into it.  
His hands come around to rest on Ray’s hips, drawing him closer and without realising – lifting the smaller man up a little, off his tiptoes and into the air. It doesn’t seem to bother Ray who just whines and clutches onto the front of Joel’s shirt, fisting his hands into the fabric. 

“I don’t mean to intrude or anything…” a voice sounds from beside them and Joel breaks away and turns to see Michael standing there. He’s got an eyebrow quirked and is looking between them with some sort of amused air of confusion. 

“It’s just we’re meant to be filming a Let’s Play Ray… in case you forgot.”  
Ray turns an interesting shade of pink and Joel drops him in shock. 

“You work here?” he asks and Ray glares up at him. 

“Yes I god damn work here! Ground shock is a thing, you know!”  
Joel pulls him into a hug, ignoring the curses and the glare now aimed at his chest where Ray’s face is squished. 

“You work here,” he declares happily and Ray squirms and tries to speak but can’t get much out past Joel’s shirt that doesn’t just sound like muffled swear words.  
Michael watches them both and looks vaguely concerned about Ray’s air intake. 

“Do I want to know what’s going on?” he asks, gesturing toward them in a helpless flick of his hands. 

“My soulmate works here,” Joel tells him, “his names Ray? Right?”

If anything Michael looks even more weirded out, “yeah…” 

He pulls the small Puerto Rican away from himself to cup his face in his hands and smile down at him, “You want to go on a date Ray?” 

Ray’s death glare softens and he looks a little embarrassed as he mutters out, “yeah,” but he smiles afterwards and so does Joel, just smiling at each other like love-struck idiots and the age gap doesn’t even register as a problem anymore. 

“This is real cute guys… but we HAVE A LET’S PLAY TO FILM!” Michael yells, grabbing Ray’s arm and dragging him down the corridor into the Achievement Hunter Office.  
Joel frowns at their backs. 

“Anyone want to guess who Ray was making out with outside the bathroom?” Michael questions as he drags Ray in and everyone laughs until it registers that Ray isn’t and he’s red and he does look decidedly like he’s just been making out. 

“Uh… Barb?” Geoff asks though he knows it’s not right. 

“Try someone manlier…” Michael deadpans, keeping his grip tight on Ray so he can’t run away. 

“Burnie?” Gavin asks, guffawing at his desk. 

“Nope.”  
“It’s Joel,” Ryan says distractedly as he headshots someone in his game. 

Michael pauses, thrown and glances back at Ryan.  
“How do you know that?” he asks and Ryan gives him a creepy smile, remaining silent.  
“HOW THE FUCK DID YOU KNOW THAT RYAN?” 

Ray stares too, wondering how Ryan did actually know that. When Ryan turns back around fully, Ray feels a twinge of his neck and he brings up a hand to touch where no doubt another of Joel’s speeches is laying itself out.  
Ryan looks oddly intense where he’s sitting but without saying a word, pushes his sleeves down over what appears to be his own soulmark and turns back to Halo. 

“What the fuck Ryan!? How the fucking hell are you so creepy?”

**Author's Note:**

> Continued in a seperate story (that you do not need to read to enjoy this one). 
> 
> http://archiveofourown.org/works/5539904
> 
> There it is


End file.
